Dr. Ernest Mario serves as Chairman at Chimerix. He served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer at Alza. He also is an Angel Investor. He served as chairman and chief executive officer at Capnia. He is a board member of Xenoport. He also is a Venture Partner with Pappas Ventures, a Research Triangle Park, NC life science venture capital firm. Dr. Mario served in management at a number of drug companies prior to 1989 when he was named Chief Executive of Glaxo, plc, then the second-largest drug company in the world. He subsequently served as Chairman and CEO of Reliant Pharmaceuticals, Inc. until its acquisition by GlaxoSmithKline in 2007. Dr. Mario serves as a director of Boston Scientific Corporation, Celgene Corporation, TONIX Pharmaceuticals Holdings Corp., Kindred Biosciences Inc. and XenoPort Inc. He is active in numerous educational and healthcare organizations. He is Chairman of the American Foundation for Pharmaceutical Education, a Director of the Gladstone Foundation, and past Chairman of the Duke University Health System. Dr. Mario earned a BS in pharmacy at Rutgers and his MS and PhD in physical sciences at the University of Rhode Island. He holds honorary doctorates from URI and Rutgers, the latter of which in 2001 renamed its pharmacy school the Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy. In 2007, he was awarded the Remington Medal by the American Pharmacists' Association, pharmacy's highest honor.